International Women's Day: Google Celebrates Women In Technology

Google is helping celebrate International Women's Day Friday (March 8), by hosting livestreamed discussions and keynotes from women in technology. The 24-hour initiative, in conjunction with the Voices Global Conference, celebrates and examines the contributions women have made to technology.

Over 12 hours of on-demand and live talks will be provided by Google in honor of International Women's Day. Viewers will get a chance to hear from women employed in the fields of computer science, engineering and technology.

The founder of Global Tech Women, Deanna Kosajuru, launched the conference to connect women in technical professions all around the world. Its mission is to "individually and collectively to discuss, collaborate and celebrate the contributions of technical women." Google helped to sponsor Kosajuru on her project "India's Grace Hopper Celebration of Women in Computing" in 2010. The success of the conference grew significantly by 2012 and Google jumped at the opportunity to help with the Voices Global Conference.

"We knew it was a great opportunity to help women and other audiences around the world learn more and get inspired about the contributions women are making to technology and computer science," said Beryl Nelson, software engineering manager at Google.

Google offers interviews with women who are technology leaders in the Women Techmakers series, like Mani Abrol, head of Lexity India. Female pioneers in technology like Grace Hopper, who invented COBOL, have made contributions in computer programming, so highlighting their efforts can serve as role models for young women today.

Google says it strongly supports diversity and inclusion and implements this ideology into its corporation's developers, employees and users.

"We work hard to bring attention to diversity and inclusion in everything we do not only because it makes sense, but because it's the right thing to do," said Google. The Women Techmakers series was launched last year in the spirit of bringing women leaders in technology industries to the forefront.